Bechara el-Khoury

Bechara el-Khoury (10 August 1890-11 January 1964) was President of Lebanon from 22 November 1943 to 18 September 1952, preceding Camille Chamoun.

Biography
Bechara el-Khoury was born on 10 August 1890 in Rechmaya, Lebanon to a family of Catholic Maronites. As a prominent lawyer who had served as Prime Minister of the Greater Lebanon under France, he opposed French rule over Syria and Lebanon and drew up the 1943 National Pact, which stated that the President is always a Maronite Catholic, the Prime Minister is always a Sunni Muslim, the Speaker of the Parliament is always a Shia Muslim, the Deputy Speaker of the Parliament and the Deputy Prime Minister are always Greek Orthodox Christian, the Chief of the General Staff is always a Maronite Catholic, and the Chief of Army Staff is always Druze. Parliament members were always in a ratio of 6:5 in favour of Christians to Muslims until the Ta'if Accords of 1990. This led to Lebanon becoming a multi-confessional state, and it made it unique in that Christians were given control of the government in a Middle Eastern society. During his tenure, Lebanon had great economic growth, but Lebanon was defeated by Israel in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and its economy was strained when 100,000 Palestinian refugees entered Lebanon. He left office in 1952, and he died in 1964.